Congress livid over lags in coronavirus testing

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Accurate testing is critical to stopping an outbreak: When one person gets a confirmed diagnosis, they can be put in isolation where they won’t spread the disease further. Then their contacts can be identified and put into quarantine so they don’t spread the virus if they’ve become infected, too. That’s particularly important for a virus like this one, which seems able to spread before people show symptoms, or when their symptoms are mild.

Ever since the first case of Covid-19 was detected in the US on January 20, the government’s blunders in creating and distributing diagnostic testing have greatly handicapped our response to the growing pandemic. Eaker’s story is not unique: Reports suggest providers everywhere are struggling to help their patients, while receiving frustrating guidance from authorities.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the federal government’s top infectious disease scientist, called the testing situation a “failing” at a congressional hearing on Thursday.

This is pretty pitiful

China has at Home tests. S. Korea has drive-in tests

WHAT THE F____ ARE WE DOING!!!!!!

PEOPLE ARE DYING!!!!!!!!!!

Here is a comparison testing chart US versus the others

originally posted by: Willtell

Without a doubt, there is some kind of conspiracy of either massive incompetence or some kind of pharmacy-related conspiracy to get some financial gain out of the fact that these tests in the most powerful country in the world, is lacking as if this is a primitive country.

Some sourcs have gone out of their way to lay the blame on our POTUS, which doesn't make much sense.
His effectiveness can only be as good as the administration he has supporting him- and as we've seen, the majority have opposed him in just about everything he's tried to do.
He can order the CDC to test everyone in the country, but he can't make them create the test kits they claim they don't have.
I'd like to see him outsource testing to another country at this point, but I'm sure congress would do everything in their power to block it.

How about testing all people who die of similar symptoms? Would be hell of a lot cheaper.

nvm

originally posted by: underwerks

originally posted by: shooterbrody
a reply to: underwerks
do you regularly go to the doctor when you have a cold?
or seasonal allergies?

here, where I am, not many people are freaking out
there are still packages of toilet tissue and hand sanitizer at the stores
we are out of n95 face masks, but were able to get some before the run on them

No, I don’t. This isn’t just the “flu”.

Do other countries routinely quarantine themselves because of the yearly cold or flu? Or how about weld their citizens into their apartments in a forced quarantine? No?

I’m in Tennessee. And there isn’t one package of toilet paper left in the Wal-Mart near me. What the public needs more than anything is accurate information. And the current government is doing everything in their power to make sure no one has any. Down to classifying any meeting having to do with the Coronavirus.

Does that sound like something people normally do over the cold or flu?

CDC.gov

Tom Hanks, if he were in the US, wouldn’t even have been tested. He got tested in Australia where it is free and universally available.


Here in the US THERE NOT EVEN TESTING PEOPLE COMING IN FROM OTHER COUNTRIES AT AIRPORTS

Their only screening, a screening IS NOT A TEST.

I tell you, this is a national scandal and disgrace and people are going to suffer because of it.

We suppose to be the greatest country on the planet and can't get this simple and easy process going smoothly, that other countries easily have done.

As I pointed out in a now closed thread, the majority of the states remaining that haven't reported a single case are also some of the worst ranked when it comes to healthcare.

Do we really think it's just a lucky coincidence that the states that are probably the least prepared for this are also the ones that are clean?

Not a chance. My neighboring county in West Virginia put out a post saying they don't have any tests, so if you suspect you have Covid-19 just self-isolate. And that's one of the more well off counties in the state. I don't want to know how completely unprepared they are in more rural areas/coal country.

a reply to: ketsuko

I am quite familiar with the stats. I am also quite familiar with the healthcare meltdown in Italy and this thing is just getting started.

Norway just closed down.

Please, forget what you have been told by the flu bros and see what is happening and prepare accordingly. This is going to cause severe disruptions, school closings, etc.

We can hope it will burn out in a few months but we cannot bet on that.

The entire country of Norway is 'shutting down'
theweek.com...

Down to classifying any meeting having to do with the Coronavirus.

a reply to: putnam6


There are people in this administration that continually leak information to undermine our POTUS. Having a classified meeting was the wisest choice, IMHO.

Hopefully none that were there will be leaking info to fuel the panic fire sweeping the country.

So, the US refused, the Trump administration, to use the test the WHO created they could have had the first day.

Did they say, oh no, we are the great America, we don’t need the WHOs test?

And proceed to bungle creating a test here in America?

Or were they thinking about our own pharmacy industry windfall they might get through this pandemic?

All that should be investigated.


I want to make this absolutely clear. This is NOT a thread to bash Trump. Though as commander in chief he is responsible. As he takes credit for the good economy he has to take the blame when this kind of stuff occurs. No, this is about the absolutely VERY STRANGE situation about the lack of testing in America.

I think this will 100 years from now still be debated on its strangeness.

Soon I'll do a thread on the LIKELY conspiracy angle on this testing debacle, but not now.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: DanDanDat


Look at it this way:

You have 100 people. If they all get sick with it, 20 of them will need medical intervention while 80 of them will develop very mild illness and get well on their own. Some will know they're sick; others won't even notice they had anything.

Put them in a population of 1,000.

Those 20 who land in the hospital cause a splash. They have the new disease because they get tested. And maybe 10 of them get very, very ill with 6 or 7 of them going on to die.

Now the community is in a state of fear. They don't know that 80 of them are also ill with the same thing. Those people are never tested. What they see is a disease that makes everyone who gets it so sick they go into the hospital and that kills a high percentage of those who have it.

So long as the testing is restricted, the rest of the populace can be told over and over that some of them will have mild symptoms, even most of them, but they don't see the data because those people aren't tested and so they never know.

Except all relevant data to date clearly points to the fact that some number of people are out in the community with mild to no symptoms. Do we know if that number is 80% or 90% or 70%? Maybe not; but you would have to be willfully ignorant to think at this time that we are dealing with a "disease that makes everyone who gets it so sick they go into the hospital and that kills a high percentage of those who have it. "

What is the difference between being "told over and over that some of them will have mild symptoms, even most of them" and being told the results of some test?

In both cases you have to trust the person telling you both bits of information. If you don't trust them telling you the first; why do you trust them telling the second? Just because they hold up a fancy box they call a "test"?

I'm a Test Systems Engineer by trade; I've spent the last 20 years designing and building equipment and processes that preform testing. When I sell my work product to my customers there are all kinds of fancy mechanisms to prove I have done a good job. But unless my customer takes it upon themselves to deconstruct and fully understand what I have built for them there are all kinds of fancy ways to fool those mechanisms. In practicality there is no way for them to really know what I have built is doing the job they want (except time); no test result could ever change that.

And look all kinds of test data is coming out of china and other countries who are farther along than we are ... and we have a whole message board here that doesn't believe that data.

So again what value is added by "testing every one who wants to be tested"? And more importantly what value is there in a Congress that gets livid because its not happening.

Someone can test negative for the virus and catch it when going home at the grocery store when they are picking up ice cream for their sore throat.

I want to make this absolutely clear. This is NOT a thread to bash Trump. Though as commander in chief he is responsible. As he takes credit for the good economy he has to take the blame when this kind of stuff occurs. No, this is about the absolutely VERY STRANGE situation about the lack of testing in America.

a reply to: Willtell

The decisions of a president can only be as good as the information his advisers present to him. His advisers seem to bee some of the most untrustworthy bunch in American history, undermining him at every opportunity.
Every time he tries to replace one of the previous administrations advisers he is fought tooth and nail.
It's generally accepted for a new president to choose his own trusted people to be advisers, but this POTUS hasn't been allowed that luxury, even though most of the obama hold-overs have been shown to be biased and not above shenanigans to undermine the present administration, wasting millions and millions of dollars.

originally posted by: Willtell
So, the US refused, the Trump administration, to use the test the WHO created they could have had the first day.

Did they say, oh no, we are the great America, we don’t need the WHOs test?

And proceed to bungle creating a test here in America?

Or were they thinking about our own pharmacy industry windfall they might get through this pandemic?

All that should be investigated.


I want to make this absolutely clear. This is NOT a thread to bash Trump. Though as commander in chief he is responsible. As he takes credit for the good economy he has to take the blame when this kind of stuff occurs. No, this is about the absolutely VERY STRANGE situation about the lack of testing in America.

I think this will 100 years from now still be debated on its strangeness.

Soon I'll do a thread on the LIKELY conspiracy angle on this testing debacle, but not now.

Or they didn't trust the WHO (like virtual everyone on this message board)?

If you are sick enough and a Dr. thinks you should be tested then that's good enough for me.

Stop making the testing the issue. I don't feel I need to be tested and I'm always coughing and sneezing from allergies.

a reply to: nugget1

Amazing nothing has leaked out...no?

a reply to: nugget1

The President has a well regarded medical doctor in his Cabinet that he himself appointed. Instead of appointing him to lead the coronavirus task force he went with the Vice President that still thinks the science is out on the dangers of smoking.

I'm sorry but you can't blame a move like that on Obama and the Dems.

a reply to: Willtell

Your title isn't really clear. Lags is slang for convicts in Australia and, thanks to the popularity of Australian melodramas over here, in the UK too. When I first read it I thought you were menaing Congress was in uproar about criminals in Caronavirus testing...

All you have to do is look at the age group the deaths are occurring in to understand the statistics. The countries with the highest death rates also have the highest elderly population.
Perhaps concentrating on assisted living/nursing homes, our senior population and those at risk with underlying conditions would be a better option that the way it's being handled now.
a reply to: DanDanDat